This paper examines the impact of firms' conduct on market structure. It studies the evolution of concentration in UK manufacturing following the abolition of cartels using a theoretical framework based on Sutton's theory of market structure and a panel data set for four-digit industries over...

This paper investigates the characteristics of litigated patents by combining for the first time information about patent case filings from the U.S. district courts and detailed data from the U.S. Patents and Trademark Office. A series of indicators is constructed for the factors which the...

This paper addresses the questions of the effects of diversification strategies on firms' profitability. Empirical analyses do not seem to confirm the hypothesis that diversification is the optimal response to the presence of synergies and hence generates higher profits. It is shown that this...

This paper examines the impact of price competition on advertising/R&D expenditure and market structure. General theoretical results are derived which restrict the space of possible outcomes regarding the behaviour of concentration and advertising/R&D expenditure following an intensification of...

Countertrade - or reciprocal buying - is defined as a transaction involving (at least) a two-way transfer of goods, rather than a singular transfer of goods for money. The main objective of this paper is to explain the extensive use of countertrade both between countries and between firms within...

Some recent empirical findings suggest that there are intrinsic links between the statistical regularities regarding cohort survival patterns, the persistence of firm turnover, and shakeout during an industry life-cycle. This paper presents a theoretical model which explains these regularities...

This paper investigates the effect of the threat and occurrence of patent litigation on the private value of patent protection. Potential challenges are introduced into a renewal model as a factor in patentee decisions as to whether a patent is worth maintaining. The model yields testable...

This paper analyses a dynamic game of investment in R&D or advertising, where current investments change future market conditions. It investigates whether underinvestment can be supported in equilibrium by the threat of escalation in investment outlays. When there are no spillovers, or there is...

This paper proposes an equilibrium concept for a class of games in which players make irreversible costly decisions; these games have been widely used in the recent I.O. literature. The equilibrium concept is defined, not in the space of strategies, but in the space of (observable outcomes). It...

The existence of a negative relationship between cartel stability and the level of excess capacity in an industry has for a long time been the dominant view in the traditional IO literature. Recent supergame-theoretic contributions (e.g. Brock and Scheinkman, 1985) appear to show that this view...